Filmmaker Finds Out a 'K' Can Be Owned

By JENNIFER MEDINA

Published: January 27, 2007

The cast was entirely Israeli. The script was entirely in Hebrew. The film was entirely treif.

It was pornographic and it carried a kosher label on its cover, which its producer, Oren Cohen, said he thought would help the buzz.

To the right of a woman with shiny black hair and piercing blue eyes posing seductively, there it was: the Hebrew letter kof, with a ''k'' tucked inside.

For those in the know, it is a certification of kosher, stamped on packages of matzo or mozzarella to indicate they have been prepared under rabbinic supervision.

Perhaps a tad sacrilegious, thought Mr. Cohen, the owner of Tight Fit, a production company based in California, but nothing an observant Jew would confuse with permission from a rabbi to view pornographic material.

Then this week, a letter from a rabbi's lawyer raised the possibility that Mr. Cohen's marketing move might indeed be illegal.

''As a leading company in the area of kosher food certification, companies are only contractually authorized to utilize the Kof-K trademark to promote and/or market their food products,'' the letter said.

The symbol is the trademarked property of the Kof-K company, which is based in Teaneck, N.J., and certifies food like bread, juice and cookies as abiding by kosher standards. Those who observe Jewish dietary laws consider any food lacking one of a handful of such symbols, known as hechsherim, as treif, or unkosher.

Mr. Cohen, the son of a Moroccan Israeli and the third generation of his family involved in the pornography industry, was a bit perplexed.

''I thought, what -- they own a letter?'' Mr. Cohen said in an interview.

They do. And they have for more than 30 years, said Rabbi Yehuda Rosenbaum, the administrative director of the company.

After Rabbi Rosenbaum was alerted to the film, he spoke with Mr. Cohen, explaining that it would be highly inappropriate for people to see his company's label on a lewd video.

Mr. Cohen, eager to play the role of good Jewish boy, obliged. Within 24 hours, he sent Mr. Rosenbaum a new copy of the cover. This time the trademarked symbol was replaced with the English word ''Kosher.''

''I choose my battles judiciously,'' Mr. Cohen said. He did not, however, hesitate to have his publicist leak the news to some gossip and pornography news outlets.

Mr. Rosenbaum, while none too eager to talk about the film, whose title is a profane play on the word ''Israelis,'' said he was pleased that the company responded so swiftly.

''They didn't realize it was wrong, and they were really cooperative,'' Mr. Rosenbaum said. ''Case closed.''

Kof-K routinely alerts customers to food items that have been inadvertently labeled improperly. This, so far as Mr. Rosenbaum said he could recall, was the first time that he had to deal with an inedible item.

Mr. Cohen said he doubted that the new label would hurt sales. He said that with reports of the spat popping up on Web sites like Adult Video News and Jewtastic.com, he was certain the film, with English subtitles, would have international success.